Tuesday, May 06, 2008

Fubardemocratus - The Saga Continueth...

Lawd, have mercy!

If it’s Tuesday then there must be another Democratic Primary.

Shit, if the radio starts playing Sonny and Cher a bitch will be living in the movie Groundhog Day (wince).

Anyhoo, this bitch shall share a Primary Day dinner with my Voter Education students…so at least this shit will be interesting. Newish readers should know that this bitch volunteers as a Voter Education teacher at local women’s shelters.

My students have already requested that I moderate a debate after dinner and before the results come in.

I’m so proud! Shit, I’d cry if I were wearing waterproof mascara.

Blink.

Their topics of choice are the gas tax and healthcare.

Pause…rub hands together in gleeful anticipation…continue.

KLW requested the gas tax. She has been at the shelter for several months, is 18 years old and has a beautiful newborn wee one with tons of hair. KLW is annoyed at the gas tax debate because she can’t afford a car right now and doesn’t see how what little savings it will provide will help her. She’d rather hear a plan to control the price of gas because she feels it is driving up the price of milk and other food items.

“When you live paycheck to paycheck and the stuff you need go up it makes the difference between making it and not making it.” KLW

Miss Thang will face off against her favorite debate foe, TDK…who has a car and a strong opinion on this matter.

MSD requested healthcare. She is new to the shelter and is expecting her first child in three months. MSD is 19 years old and feels that everyone should have healthcare. She doesn’t like the idea of mandates because she feels it would be a burden on the working poor universal healthcare should be helping out.

Miss D will face off against the formidable Lady B…who is all for universal healthcare with mandates and will “school” anyone who says different.

Dinner prepared by someone else…two topical debates between my students…and all the grape Kool-Aid I can drink.

Your students still sound fantastic. Have they done library/internet research, or will they be debating from personal experience alone?

Personally, I think the whole idea of a gas tax holiday is several kinds of uncompostable shit rolled into one. You know something's screwy when the UAE is building a no-cars-allowed zero-carbon-emission 50k-inhabitant city, and US politicians are proposing changing the tax laws because the price of gas might crimp the summer driving season.

I love how you perfectly express both my feeling of exhaustion about the primaries, and my feeling that it really does matter who is elected and what they do on these issues. AND my feeling that there are good arguments all around, so let's roll our sleeves up and get to work!

Thank you for another wonderful post, and for being out there writing and doing what you do.

Just had to take this moment to say: I love your passion for your students.

The first time I voted, I cried.

Hell, up to two years ago, I STILL got choked up when I entered the voting booth, sometimes.

My little teeny rural county moved to mail-in ballot only for nearly all elections two years ago. *sigh* I miss my polling place -- it was the absolutely crappiest room in the middle school -- but it was OUR absolutely crappiest room in the middle school -- if only for that day.

Darlin' -- never doubt it for a moment -- with these acts, we change the world.